Regardless of Employee Protest Riot Refuses to Budge on Arbitration Issue
It’s not secret that Riot Games, the company behind the popular title League of Legends, has landed in some hot water with their employees, as well as many in the industry, regarding their arbitration policy. Despite a recent employee walkout the company has decided not to change their stance on the issue.
At the beginning of this month a number of Riot employees organized a walkout to protest the arbitration policy. At the time company officials confirmed that there would be no consequence to these employees taking part in the protest and Riot Games also stated they were opening up an internal dialogue about the company’s culture, promising change. It seems that despite this, they have ultimately decided that it will keep its current policy which requires all sexual harassment or discrimination complaints within the company be dealt with through arbitration.
Here’s what Riot recently had to say about the lack of change, “Ultimately, given the complexities of ongoing litigation, we will not change our employee agreements while in active litigation. We know not everyone agrees with this decision, but we also know everyone does want Riot to continue to improve.” And though it’s keeping the same stance on the policy, the company says they have plans to create a council on diversity and inclusion and the employees involved in this will review aspects of their current code of conduct.
The leaders of the employees walkout, Indu Reddy, Ronnie Blackburn, and Jocelyn Monahan released their own statement in response to Riot Games. “We’re disappointed leadership doesn’t seem to be considering any major changes to their active policy.” They did however mention that they were “blown away by the passion, solidarity and vulnerability that workers who support the walkout are showing.”
What do you think about Riot’s latest statement on the issue? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below and don’t forget to keep it locked for updates!